Beautiful Scars

Shall we compare scars?

When I think of comparing scars, the first thing that comes to mind is a group of little kids. They go around and show each other their boo-boos. As I recall from those days, bragger’s rights are claimed by the kid with the biggest (or grossest) scab or scar.

It also reminds me of a scene in Lethal Weapon 3, where Gibbs and Cole begin showing off their “wounded in the line of duty” scars. For those two, it was a matter of weird pride.

Those are two very different examples (one of them out of fiction) that depict a “shall we compare scars” moment.

But realistically, we don’t see many of these in our day to day lives, do we?

I think it is because we have learned to hide our scars.

We’re ashamed of them.
They are imperfections.
They are not beautiful.
They distract.

Now, read this next one slowly…
They mean we did something wrong.

Have you ever had that happen? Someone sees a scar, and the first question is: “what did you do there?”

It’s a colloquialism, yes, but there is still some little jab to it: what did YOU DO to get that scar?

Scars are our fault. At least, that’s the feeling we have. Even if something happens that isn’t our fault, we think of what we could have done to avoid it.

We feel what happened is our fault.
So we hide our scars.

They are ugly.
Nobody wants to see them.
We don’t want to answer the uncomfortable questions.

So we hide.

Now, not all scars are physical, but we know our reaction to them often is the same.
Have you ever been hurt by someone?

Not physically injured… I mean hurt.

Someone did something, or said something, that cut you so deep the pain was almost physical?

A nasty comment?
A self-serving action that left you crushed?
Maybe just what someone did to make you feel small, unimportant, unloved?
Those things that can leave you on the ground in your mind, hurt and bleeding?

How do these wounds heal?

We know, or at least we have some idea, of how physical wounds heal. We have a wound that starts out angry and red. We keep it clean. We keep it bandaged. Eventually, it closes up and maybe leaves a scar behind. Sometimes the scar even fades with time.

But what about those wounds others don’t (or can’t) see?

These are tricky. They don’t always heal right away.

They often don’t heal because they CAN’T heal. They can’t heal because your mind is like a surgeon on meth. As soon as a wound closes, the mind thinks it has to open that wound back up again, root around inside, see if there is anything left in it.

There always is something left, and as long as that wound is not allowed to heal, it is a source of infection. It poisons you.

The invisible wounds are constantly opened back up.
They refuse to completely heal.
They often get uglier with time.

So how do you heal from being hurt like that?

Step one is forgiveness.

This is a hotly discussed topic, so I want to lay it out in as simple terms as possible.

Forgiveness does not make the wound go away.
What was done is still done.
What was wrong at the time is still wrong.
The person or persons who hurt you are still wrong for doing so.

Forgiveness also does not mean you need to go back for more.
You can forgive and set boundaries.
You can forgive someone but not allow them in your life again.

Forgiveness is not an acquittal. You do not let the person who hurt you “off the hook” by forgiving her or him.

In forgiving, you let yourself off the hook.

I don’t know who said this, but it’s a good analogy: holding on to a grudge is like drinking poison every day and hoping the other person dies.
Holding on to a grudge and not forgiving: that’s the surgeon on meth inside your mind, constantly reopening those wounds, rooting around and making them even worse.

Forgiveness lets you off the hook.
It allows the wounds to close and start healing.

Corrie Ten Boom once said: “Forgiving is setting a prisoner free, only to find our the prisoner was me.”

If you don’t know who Corrie Ten Boom is, google her name. There is an incredible story there that will show you a shining example of forgiveness.

Forgiveness lets you off the hook.

You are freed from constantly reliving the hurt in your mind, playing “shoulda coulda woulda.”

Forgiveness let’s the past stay in the past.
Forgiveness lets the wounds close and start to heal.

Step two is, stop being ashamed of your scars.

Remember how I started: “shall we compare scars?”

Not as a competition; not as a matter of pride.

Just be who you are, including all those things that make up who you are.

That includes the hurt…
That includes the wrong that has been done to you…
That includes the scars.

Scars don’t mean you did something wrong.
Scars are not imperfections.
Scars should not distract.
Scars are not ugly.

In fact, you can even find scars to be beautiful.

Look at the Japanese art of Kintsugi.
In Kintsugi, broken pottery is repaired using lacquer infused with silver, gold, and platinum powder.

The result is something even more beautiful than the original.

Why?

Because of the scars.

The Kintsugi artist does not try to hide the brokenness. He repairs it and makes the result a beautiful story of how what was once broken was made whole again.

Look at Jesus. The nail prints on his hands and feet, the wound from the spear in his side, the thorn marks on his head.

His scars.

These are the emblems of his suffering – the suffering that set us free.

In the same way, he heals us.

We were all broken, and during some times in our lives, we may have even been broken again and again, but Jesus makes us whole.

And he doesn’t want to hide what was broken. He wants to show how it was made whole.

That’s your story.
That’s story.
That’s OUR story.

In the forgiveness of others, the scars left behind by the past can heal. They won’t go away, but what is left in their place is something that makes you even more than what you were before.

So don’t be ashamed of your scars.

They may be the roadmap someone who is lost and hurt is looking for.
They are part of the background of your story.
How you were once broken, but made whole again.

It’s your story.
Tell it.

Beautiful scars.

God loves you.
I love you.
And there’s nothing you can do about it!